Posted: 29 August 2014. Updated: 29 August 2014
Revealed by the National Anti-Vivisection Society: the needless use of monkeys for disease research. These painful tests cause untold suffering and waste funds that could otherwise be spent on advanced alternatives. On International Primate Day, September 1st, please help us stop these unnecessary and unethical monkey tests.
In the US, 18 macaque monkeys were shipped from the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Disease in Maryland to Georgia, where they were injected with the smallpox virus. They were then ‘treated’ with either a placebo or the test substance, requiring frequent anaesthesia to monitor effectiveness. Those who survived the experiment, supported by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), were killed after 28 days. The placebo group suffered an average of 1,500 skin lesions, lost up to 13% of their body weight and three suffered hypothermia.
There is no need to use monkeys for smallpox research. The last known case of the disease was in the late 1970s and it was officially declared as eradicated in 1980. Vaccines for smallpox have already been assessed in people and a number of countries including the UK and US have stockpiles.
This research also goes against efforts to develop a non-animal method of a rabies vaccine for new world monkeys due to the large number of animals needed for such research and the significant pain and distress it can cause.
Each of the painful tests described above were completely unnecessary and unscientific. In addition to the flaws mentioned, even though monkeys are our closest relatives in the animal kingdom, how they are affected by disease cannot be translated to people.
Sadly in the UK alone over 2,000 monkeys are experimented on each year; in the US the figure is over 70,000. Many monkeys are imported from countries like Mauritius where the NAVS has exposed terrible suffering on breeding farms. With the exception of Air France, all major passenger airlines have ceased their involvement in this brutal trade
Thanks for taking a few moments to help monkeys suffering in breeding facilities and laboratories around the world this International Primate Day. Together we can save the primates.